


Time in a Bottle

by Niji_Hitomi_Iscariot



Series: Tumblr Drabbles [6]
Category: Original Work
Genre: M/M, Weight Gain, oc kiss week 2016, sci fi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-14
Updated: 2016-01-14
Packaged: 2018-05-14 00:16:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5722447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Niji_Hitomi_Iscariot/pseuds/Niji_Hitomi_Iscariot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Corey is a freshman in college when the strange demon kisses him for the first time. The next time he sees him, Nyght remembers things that haven't happened yet. And what does the Ultima Project have to do with all of this!?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Time in a Bottle

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be a fluffy drabble between one of my Princes of Hell, and nonbinarygaldino‘s fursona, Corey the chinchilla.
> 
> Then it grew a plot… >3> I blame Corey. lol
> 
> The song is [Time in a Bottle by Jim Croce](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1YxczPEPrs) and the rest is a product of my over-enthusiastic imagination. XD

The first time it happened the young chinchilla didn’t know what he was doing. He was sloppy and nervous, and hadn’t expected it. Of course, that was sort of understandable, given that Nyght had spotted him coming around the corner and simply swept him off his feet in a liplock that spoke of _far_ more experience than the thirty-something demon should have had given it was their first meeting.

“Wh-what are you doing?!” The silver rodent exclaimed, slightly breathless and blinking; the edges of his ears were bright red in a full-on blush.

Nyght blinked back, red and green eyes going wide for a second. “Oh! Oh this is it, isn’t it? You don’t know me.”

“Of course not! Why would I know you!? I’ve never even been to this campus before!” Flustered and trying not to show it, the chinchilla smoothed his shirt down over his front. “Is that a common thing around here?! To just march up to strangers on the street and sexually assault them!”

Nyght leered, “Aha, but you liked it.”

“Wh-wh-what!?” He was shorter and rounder and defensive as Hell.

He was adorable.

But time was a wasting, and Nyght had a mission he needed to complete. Stopping off at his alma mater was a distraction he couldn’t resist. Especially now that he knew this was the first time. So he grinned at the smaller fur.

“You’re gorgeous when you’re flustered, Corey.” His tail wagged and his stuck his hands in the pockets of his hoodie to avoid grabbing the chinchilla up in his arms, like he wanted to. “Never change, babe. I love ya just the way you are.”

The he gave him a second kiss, this time a small peck on the mouth, and started off into the crowd that was beginning to gather at the other end of the promenade.

“But! Wait! How do you know my name!? Who are you?!” Corey waved his arms, trying to flag down the disappearing demon. “AND WHY DID YOU KISS ME!?”

Nyght laughed, his tongue hanging out of his mouth, “Spoilers, Chillbutt! You’ll find out when you’re older!”

It was months before Corey saw Nyght again. Weeks of confusion and over-thinking and he’d just about convinced himself that the demonic wolf-dog had been mistaken. Had taken him for someone else, and had simply been lucky enough to pick his name out of the hundreds that had been floating around that day.

That day having been the day the Ultima Project was launched after all.

But still.

It was shortly before Winter Break, finals had just been finished, and Corey was taking a much needed day off from the outside world. Curled up with a significant stockpile of snacks, Netflix, and the blanket Silva crocheted for him the year before. His plan for the day was to stay in, stuff himself silly on junk food, and watching mindless—yet emotionally compelling—cartoons all day.

Then someone knocked on the door.

It wasn’t an urgent, the building is on fire, kind of knock, or even a timid, don’t really want to be noticed, sort of knock. The person very obviously knew that Corey was inside, and was deliberate about trying to get his attention.

As such, when he didn’t answer after the fifth time, Nyght simply walked through the door as though it wasn’t there.

“Really now. Is that any way to treat your boyfriend on a date night?” He put his hands on his hips and huffed.

“Date?! Boyfriend!?” Corey had his knees drawn up to his chin and the blanket pulled down around his head, as though he wasn’t wearing clothing underneath it.

“Naturally!” Nyght grinned, tail wagging and seeming to have already forgotten that he’d been ignored not five minutes ago. “Every Wednesday, you chow down on junk food until you feel like you’re gonna puke, I rub your belly, and we veg out watching whatever series it is that’s caught your attention this week. Is it still One Piece, or have you started Steven Universe yet?”

“Excuse you! I don’t even know how you know what dorm I’m in, or where you came from, but you can’t just kiss me silly out in public, then disappear for months, and expect me to just accept some fanciful story that you _obviously_ made up because we didn’t watch cartoons together last week. WE,” the chinchilla gestured between the two of them, “didn’t do anything last week. YOU have me mistaken with someone else, and I’ll not help you cheat on your boyfriend.”

A small frown pinched the demon dog’s eyebrows, bringing the blond spots together in a wrinkle, and he tilted his head to the side in the fashion of all confused canines. “Uhh… Oh! Yeah, you shouldn’t tell me things like that. It’s not fair to you.”

“And that’s another thing, you need to explain yourself. Right now.”

“Umm… can’t we just watch the show and get to the part where you’re trying not to pass out in a food coma?” Nyght’s ears drooped and he ducked his head, his tail tucked in next to his jeans. “Cuz this conversation won’t end well, and you probably wouldn’t understand most of it anyway. Metaphysical temporal transportation isn’t your specialty.”

“Temporal transpor—what?!” Corey rubbed the side of his head, sighing. He didn’t realize the blanket had fallen down around his hips.

“Nevermind. Just trust me, okay?”

“Why?”

Nyght smiled softly, “Because someone took me in when I was a freshman and taught me that it was okay to trust people. He loved me and treated me like someone precious. Like someone he’d known most of his life.”

Corey frowned, skeptical. “I don’t see what that has to do with me, but I have the feeling that if I ask you’re just going to give me that ‘spoilers’ line again. Aren’t you?”

“Yeah, though you really shouldn’t tell me what I did the last time you saw me. It gives me an advantage.”

The chinchilla raised an eyebrow, then shook his head. “Nope. Not gonna ask about that either. Let’s just watch the show and whatever. But I demand cuddles. You look fluffy and since you got to—oh right… spoilers. Okay. Still. C’mon then.”

He blushed again, shifting over on his bed so there was enough room under the blanket for the hoodie-wearing Hellhound. Nyght gladly obliged him, pulling him back against his broader chest. As the ‘date’ progressed, it happened just as the demon had said it would. Corey munched mindlessly on the snacks he’d hoarded, and by the end of the night, he was dozing, stuffed to the gills, with Nyght’s paws rubbing small circles on his belly to ease the pressure.

That time Nyght stuck around over Winter Break. They went skiing, sledding. Once Corey’s neighbor took them on a sleigh ride. Nyght insisted on treating the kind stallion to dinner afterwards, and between the two of them, they kept Corey in stitches all night long. Multiple times over the break the chinchilla found himself watching the demon dog, both confused and somewhat awestruck. It didn’t feel like this was only the second time he’d been with Nyght. It really did feel as though the demon knew him on a deep and committed level.

For the start of the New Year, Nyght gave him a journal and a pen. The book was leather bound and dyed bright cherry red for the season. It was hand-sewn together, the pages made of sturdy, yet soft, paper that absorbed the ink of his pen immediately. So as to avoid smudges. And in the front cover, Nyght had inscribed a small poem;

> __[“If I could save time in a bottle](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1YxczPEPrs)  
>  The first thing that I’d like to do  
>  Is to save every day till eternity passes away  
>  Just to spend them with you
> 
> __[If I could make days last forever](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1YxczPEPrs)  
>  If words could make wishes come true  
>  I’d save every day like a treasure and then  
>  Again, I would spend them with you
> 
> __[But there never seems to be enough time](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1YxczPEPrs)  
>  To do the things you want to do, once you find them  
>  I’ve looked around enough to know  
>  That you’re the one I want to go through time with
> 
> __[If I had a box just for wishes](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1YxczPEPrs)  
>  And dreams that had never come true  
>  The box would be empty, except for the memory of how  
>  They were answered by you.” 

And Corey kissed him by choice for the first time on the doorstep of his dorm right after they got back to the college campus. There was something in the flavor of it though.

“You’re leaving again.” He accused as soon as the demon had backed off.

Nyght squirmed, “Yes, I have to. You aren’t the only one that was on break…”

“Hmph. When will I see you again?”

“Um… from your perspective it’ll probably be a couple of weeks from now.”

“From my perspective?” Corey frowned. “You’re doing that thing again. Where you talk like you know what’s coming in my future, but not like you’re anticipating it. Like you lived it.”

“Nnn…” The demon squirmed harder, “I still can’t explain it to you. It’s sp—“

“Yeah, I know. Spoilers.”

Nyght pecked his lips, and gave his hand a squeeze, “Exactly, Chillabutt.”

“Okay, okay. Go on then.” Color flushed the insides of the chinchilla’s ears, his tail curled up against the plushiness of his backside.

Laughing, the demon did exactly that, striding away down the hall to wherever it was he came from in the first place.

Corey watched him until he’d turned the corner into the stairwell, and was gone. Then he stood there for a few minutes more, memorizing the feel of his lips against his own, and remembering the warmth of sleeping with someone else in bed with him. It made the room just that much colder to know that it would be weeks without contact until he saw his demon again.

Compelled by the fact that his internal monologue had placed possession on the intruding Hellhound, he marched to his desk and started to write in the journal. Everything they’d done since Nyght had arrived went into it, including that first shell-shocking kiss that made absolutely no sense. Even WITH the context that apparently the demon thought they had romantic history together.

And so it went. Nyght began to show up more often. Once a month, then once every couple of weeks, then once a week, until the end of the school year. Then he disappeared again. Corey was warned that it was coming though, the last time before he left, Nyght darted through door to Corey’s dorm, swept him up in his arms, and kissed him breathless. All without a word.

“By the Nine, I’ve missed you!” He said, nuzzling into the chinchilla’s fur like he hadn’t had his scent for months.

Understandably confused, Corey clung to him for balance, “Missed me? I just saw you two days ago for cartoon night. I think I’m still sporting the muffin top you gave me from all of those damn cupcakes.”

Setting him down, and doing the confused dog head tilt again, Nyght made a small ‘baroo?’ sound. Then his eyes lit up, “Oh! You’re doing the thing again where you’re telling me spoilers! Not fair, Chillabutt.” He chided playfully, “You’ll have me spoiling you in the nontemporal way~”

He giggled and spun them further into the dorm.

“Oh, but it’s been forever—oops! Aha! My turn. Sorry. Though I guess you deserve to know. It actually kinda explains a few things from my perspective… Like how cool you were the night before I… Not supposed to say that…” Nyght plopped down on the bed, pulling the plush rodent down into his arms to snuggle. “Sometimes I can’t help but wonder what you think of all of this, and then I remember that you’re experiencing things I haven’t yet. Oops!”

The demon’s eyes were wide when Corey’s head snapped up.

“Temporal transportation!”

“Oh no. No no no! Oh damn it all! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!! I didn’t mean to! It just slipped out!” Nyght’s ears pinned back against his head, and his tail curled up against his thigh, prevented from tucking between his legs by Corey’s form in his lap.

The chinchilla frowned for a moment, then shook his head, “No. If you weren’t supposed to tell me yet, you wouldn’t have said it. I think this is where it starts to make sense. You did say that things from your perspective were more ‘cool’ which I can only infer to mean that I was not upset with you… or rather won’t be upset with you when next I see you.”

“See, this is why we have the spoilers rule! You had me all confused! When you knew all along that I was gonna be okay!!” Nyght pouted.

“I am assuming you can’t tell me what exactly it is that disrupted our interaction?”

“No. That’s not even a spoilers rule thing, that’s a my dad would kick my ass from here to the Abyss if I told you thing.”

Corey nodded, “That much at least I can understand. Confidentiality being one of the most important parts of every job.”

“And that, more than anything else, is why I chose you. You understand that I can’t tell you everything, no matter how much I want to.” Nyght leaned in and nuzzled him again, hands kneading at the extra fluff around the chinchilla’s ribs. “I almost pity future me. Now that you know what’s going on.”

“Mostly. I get that you’re traveling through time, but I haven’t figured out exactly what your pattern is. So you should probably still watch your spoilers rule.”

“Oh, it’s not my rule. You’re the one that made it up. No sharing spoilers about what happens the next time we meet. It gives each of us the advantage over the other in our perspective timelines. You came up with writing everything down in the journal too. I’ve always loved that journal.”

Corey shook his head, “What did you say about yourself… ‘future me’? Yeah. Smart thinking future me.”

“Yeah!” Nyght purred in the fashion of demons, snuggled further under his chinchilla. “But enough talk, I’ve missed you so much since I saw you last. Lemme be with you for now. Even if you are skinnier than I’m used to.”

Leaning up, Corey kissed the end of the Hellhound’s nose, “Spoilers, Fluffbrain.”

“Oops.” He laughed. “Like it’s really a spoiler you’re going to stuff yourself silly when I’m not here.”

True to the hints that Nyght had given, after he left the next morning, Coey didn’t see him again until the beginning of Winter Break the next year. Though he knew he would see the demon dog again, it didn’t help his worry about it. And worry turned into stress eating, which when added on top of his weekly cartoon binge, and the pressure of school work, it really took a toll on the chinchilla’s waistline.

Not that Nyght noticed it right away.

He almost hadn’t made the train actually. Corey was sitting in his seat, watching out the window while the railway prepared for departure, and as usual his thoughts drifted to the vibrant Hellhound that had somehow, over course of a year where he’d only seen him a handful of times, integrated himself so firmly into Corey’s life that he honestly felt disappointed that Nyght hadn’t shown up all semester.

Then he plopped down in the seat across from him with a relieved exhale. “Thought I was gonna have to take the next one for a bit there. Sorry.”

Corey brightened immediately, “You made it!”

“Yeah.” Nyght squirmed, leaning in to take his hands. He burrowed his face between them, “There’s some stuff going on at home. Bad stuff. I can’t really talk about it, but I just… By the Nine I hope I’m wrong.”

“About what?”

“Nevermind. Just… c’mere.” The demon pulled on him, easily tumbling the chinchilla across the space and into his lap, aided by the lurch of the train beginning to move. “Mmmm~” Nyght hummed into the fluff of Corey’s neck, sighing, “You always smell so sweet.”

Tucking himself more comfortably into the seat with Nyght, he flushed deeply, his ears dipping back, flattered. “I hate to think what you’re used to smelling if I’m sweet.”

“You’re always sweet, Chillbutt.” Nyght licked the shell of the closest ear, making the shorter fur shiver. “And every time I see you, you’re skinnier. I swear, you need to eat more.”

“This is another one of those spoilers things, isn’t it?”

“Uhh… actually probably yeah… Sorry.”

They spent the rest of the ride talking about what Corey was studying that semester and how much bullshit the professors were putting him through just to get his exams done. And honestly, he didn’t even want to talk about the sheer number of papers and research findings he’d had to complete. Which of course meant that the better part of forty-five minutes was spent listing all of the various different ways Corey could deal with putting up with it.

In fact, Nyght put a strangely insistent focus on Corey continuing his studies, and really grilled him on what he was learning about biology, and genetics, and how close he was to picking a specialty for his field of medicine.

Chalking it up to more spoilers, the chinchilla merely answered all of his questions, unconsciously drawing his claws through the demon’s chest fluff where it peeked out over the neckline of his shirt. That more than their conversation settled him. The burden of stress he’d been carrying from the moment he appeared seemed to melt away under Corey’s gentle affection.

And each time over the course of the break, whenever Nyght started looking anxious, displaying signs of nervousness, Corey was right there, distracting him.

The night before he left, it got particularly bad. He was pacing, his tail tucked up close to his body, and licking his lips with his ears pinned back against his head.

Corey ambled up to him, still over-full from dinner, and wrapped his arms around the demon. “Fluffbrain, if you don’t calm down, you’re going to burn a hole in my parents’ floor.”

Nyght stilled, pressing his forehead against the chinchilla’s, “Sorry, luv. This week has been amazing, I couldn’t be happier. My mind’s just a million light-miles away.”

He even gave a tentative wag of his tail.

“I’ll be alright the next time you see me. I promise.”

Beginning to get the idea, Corey nodded, accepting it for what it was, and the two spent the night curled up watching holiday specials while Nyght convinced the fluffy chinchilla to somehow find room to polish off the rest of the pie that had been the dessert from dinner.

Time moved on, Corey’s second year in college passed, and with it, he began to notice his demonic boyfriend changing. It was subtle at first, his hair getting shorter, his clothes looking newer. Things that could be written off as ordinary. But by the end of his junior year, Nyght was visibly younger. His horns weren’t quite so beat up, and his coat grew shinier.

That was when he really put it together. Not that he said anything to him, but no longer was Nyght fighting off the urge to tell him spoilers about the next time they’d meet. Instead, Corey found himself biting his tongue on making comments about the change in the Hellhound’s appearance. Of course, the easiest way to avoid that was to simply stick something in his mouth, which definitely contributed to the way his own appearance changed.

Late one cartoon night, right after graduation, Corey was splayed out on the bed, hands tucked into the fur around his ribs, and drifting lightly on the sugar high Nyght had given him. The demon had his head pressed against the swell of the chinchilla’s belly, listening to the sounds it made while petting it. He hummed in contentment, and his tail wagged.

“So… mmph… what has you so… hic… happy?” Food drunk and hiccupping, Corey cooed at him.

A slight glow to the red and green of the demon’s eyes betrayed him long before he opened his mouth. “You.”

“What ‘bout me?”

“You’re amazing. I love you. I can’t believe I get to spend the rest of your life with you. You name it.” Nyght used kisses as punctuation all over the ball of belly he’d been petting. “You’re going to be the most amazing—“

“Ah ah ah. Spoilers.” Corey grinned.

Nyght groaned, burying his face against the chinchilla’s gut. “Fine! Then I get to fuck you senseless because you’re driving me nuts right now!”

“Nmph! I dunno if I can… pretty full still…” His ears drooped, and he failed at trying to sit up further.

“Shut up, Chillabutt.” The demon growled playfully, and draped himself over his boyfriend’s body to kiss him deeply.

This wasn’t the first time they’d done things, but as Corey grew more experienced, he noticed Nyght needing his guidance more and more. So while he let the demon do what he wanted, eventually, he did take control, directing him where to touch and what to rub. Bringing them both to a satisfying conclusion that left the Helhound as blissed out as the chinchilla had been not an hour before.

“I dunno what you know of things yet, but that… you’re gonna do… amazing things. You’re so…” Nght yawned wide enough that his jaw popped, “Ahh—amazing.” He mumbled, “Ultimas… nobody better…”

Corey frowned, watching his demon snooze, pillowed on his shoulder with an arm flung over the rise of his belly. “Ultimas hmm? So that’s why you were so insistent on my genetics classes.” He reached a hand over to the nightstand to pull up his phone, “Alright then. Let’s see what there is…”

As it turned out, not only were there plenty of jobs for someone with his expertise on the Ultima Project, once Corey got in and working with the genetic marvels, he found himself a focus for his graduate studies, and then a thesis to apply for his doctorate. Years passed, Nyght a continuous, if odd, fixture in his life, and the more focused he became in his work; the less he realized how time was affecting them both.

Until the uprising.

Corey was nearly fifty when he helped Komesho escape the labs. It was chaos as the experiments rose up against the scientists that had been studying them. Word had been leaked that Dr. Magnus, the head researcher on the project, had lied to everyone about his end goal, and it all came to a head when Sin rampaged through the college campus.

It was a twisted, deformed, mindlessly violent monster, with horns and claws in places there shouldn’t have been. It had a mouth for a stomach, and another for its right eye. Tentacles lashed out from its left arm, and it spit acid every time it roared. Unable to comprehend speech, unwilling to be distracted. It was bearing down on the laboratory where the Ultimas were kept overnight.

Corey, the last scientist in the lab, realized what would happen to the precious Breeders if he left with the others. Most of them were heavy with cubs, and the few that weren’t… well they were Breeders! They didn’t know how to fight! That was their twins’ job! He had to do something!

So he waddled his way as fast as he could to the release panel. A swipe of his card and the palm of his hand opened all of the pens. “Go! Go now!!”

At first the timid other halves to their project were nervous about it. The roaring of Sin tearing through the front of the building was almost enough to have them cowering in their cages.

Except for Komesho.

They were different. They were bigger, stronger, and bolder than the rest of the Breeders. They dashed out of their pen with a shank made from a toothbrush. They called to their fellows, “Follow, May-chan. May-chan show you how it done!”

And they chased the rest of the Breeders out of their pens using the shank to literally spur some of them into movement. Herding them out into the woods behind the lab with a growling snarl that was more akin to a Fighter than a Breeder.

They paused after the last one, blinking slowly with their lava-lamp eyes at chubby chinchilla. “May-chan thank. Be safe, Dr. Corey. May-chan get help.”

“Yes. Yes. Now go, May. Go!”

They gave a nod and dashed off on all fours, the shank in their mouth, and Corey didn’t have the heart to tell them he probably wouldn’t make it out of the lab. The door slammed shut behind them, and his attention was drawn to the other side of the lab, where the other door exploded open!

“WHERE ULTIMA!” Sin roared, its spittle burning through the safety railing even as it bent the metal in its tentacle grip.

Corey shivered, gripping the handle for the door lock, “GONE! I LET THEM GO! WHAT DO YOU WANT WITH THEM!?”

“GOOOOOOOOOOOOoOoOOOOoOOoOOoOO?!?!?!?!?” Sin howled, crying blood from its normal eye, and it thrashed against the wall in a fit of painful rage.

Then it launched itself, claws and tentacles reaching for the chinchilla. He wouldn’t be able to dodge in time. Years of desk work, and overindulgence made him slow, and inflexible. He cringed, his hands coming up to guard his face from the monster’s strike.

A strike that never came.

Daring to open an eye, he saw Sin writhing on the floor, howling bloody tears, and clutching at its left arm. The tentacles coiled and shriveled before his eyes. And standing between him and the monster was Nyght, in all his demonic glory.

His green Mohawk was a flaming main of viridian. His curled, Pomeranian, tail lashed long and sinuous with a wicked barb on the end. His horns were easily twice their normal length, and sharp enough to split hairs. The glow of his eyes was reflected back on the white surfaces of the lab tables and the steel floor. And he carried a spear with a flaming tip the same color as his hair.

He spoke in the Abyssal tongue, though Corey understood his words all the same, “BEGONE, ABOMINATION! MONSTROUS CHILD OF A CORRUPTED MIND!! YOUR PLACE IS IN HELL!! I BANISH YOU! NO MORE TERROR! NO MORE VIOLENCE! METE OUT YOUR RAGE BEYOND THE RIVER STYX! **BEGONE I SAY!** ”

Sin curled in on itself, and cried. For a split moment, just before Nyght plunged his spear through its chest, the wildness retreated from its normal eye, and tears matted the fur of its cheek.

Then it was gone, and the flaming spear was embedded in the steel floor, having melted the metal around the point and blasting carbon all around it like a starburst.

Silence fell except for the crackle of distant fires, and the yelling of the rescue team far beyond the building. And the demon who was his savior drew a deep breath, his ears pinned back against his head. His hair gradually dimmed, drooping around his head in strands of dark green as Corey was used to seeing, and he shrank a little, down closer to the form of the chinchilla’s boyfriend. When his tail stopped lashing, the pudgy scientist risked stepping forward.

“You know… you’re pretty impressive when you do that.”

“WHO DARES ADDRESS A PRINCE OF HELL!?” Nyght whipped around, a sword Corey hadn’t seen leveled at the chinchilla’s nose.

“Whoa!” His hands came up. “I was just saying thank you!”

“I did not come to save you, mortal. I came to collect the creature Sin for my Father’s garden. Your life was merely a coincidence.”

He was _far_ younger than Corey had ever seen him, and recognition dawned in the chinchilla’s eyes. “I see. This explains your twenty questions two weeks ago. You don’t know me yet, but believe me; you’re going to be glad you saved me. Let me buy you dinner, I know how draining using your dad’s weapons is on you.”

Nyght glared. “You know nothing. How dare you presume anything about a member of the royal family!”

“Oh, I know plenty. Listen to my mind if you think I’m lying.” Corey smiled, warm and proud. “I know just the thing to make that shiver stop. It’s quite cold up here compared to the Abyss.”

“That… is beside the point. The creature Sin has been dealt with. I am due to go home.” But the sword point was falling, and a wary curiosity was beginning to enter the demon’s body language.

“Yes, I know, but if you try to make the trip now, you’ll end up tomorrow with a horrid reaction headache and starving to boot. So, come. Having dinner with me as a thank you for saving my tail, and I do mean that literally.”

“Some…” Nyght frowned again, not liking the way the mortal fur was affecting him. “Some other time. I need… to go think about things.”

And he didn’t give Corey the chance to stop him again, he disappeared in a flash of green sulfurous smoke that left the lab quite empty and infinitely colder than it had been.

The chinchilla sighed, his ears drooping. He had finally put it together after their last encounter. Nyght was traveling opposite to him in time. So this being the first time the demon had ever met him, he was fairly certain he knew what would happen next from his perspective.

Looking around the lab, he sighed again. Well, at least it would be a fresh start in all aspects of his life. Maybe he could find Komesho and the other Ultimas, and help the Breeders reunite with their Fighter twins. He picked his way through the rubble, exiting the lab through a broken wall on the first floor.

Immediately he was assaulted by rescue EMS furs, asking him questions, someone put an oxygen mask over his muzzle, someone else was taking his blood pressure, yet another was examining his hands and reflexes, and over all he just didn’t have the time to think too much about the consequences of seeing Nyght for the last time.

Not until he was released with an all clear, and allowed to take a cab home.

Then he sank into his corner of their loveseat and stared at the empty place where his beloved Hellhound should have been.

More and more over the last couple of months, Nyght had been a constant companion. He was taking classes at the college, and spending his nights with Corey. Though he was only just over the demonic age of maturity, he was happy to do anything and everything the pudgy chinchilla had asked of him. Almost like living with a mortal canine.

But now…

If that had been the first time Nyght met him… his thoughts drifted back to how excited Nyght had been during that very first kiss they’d shared all the way back when Corey was a freshman. He reasoned now that it had been the last kiss Nyght had given him now. At least from Nyght’s perspective anyway. Of course the demon would have been excited. Corey would get to live through what Nyght had already experienced, and learn to love all over again. It would be rather like having the demon live through it again as well from a temporal point of view. Even if the demon was living it backwards.

So now what? Now that it was over.

“Throw myself into my work I suppose.” Corey mused out loud, frowning at nothing.

Then a voice came from behind him, “Well that wouldn’t make it very fun for me.”

“NYGHT!” The chinichilla whipped around, and there, leaning against the kitchen island with a steaming cup of hot chocolate in his claws, was his demon.

Just as he had been the very first time Corey met him.

“Hey, Chillabutt.” Nyght smiled.

In his haste, the chubby chinchilla forgot for a moment how difficult it had become to get out of that seat, and he wiggled his feet trying to stand. Then he flopped back and huffed, “Get over here and help, Fluffbrain!”

“Gladly.”

The demon set his mug down and crossed the distance with a purr, his tail wagging like crazy. He took hold of both of Corey’s generous paws and heaved to pull the portly rodent to his feet. Overbalanced from the tug, he fell into his arms, but unlike the most recent experience he had with his demon, Nyght stood firm and held him without issue.

“So, wait. All of that time. All of our relationship. You’ve been living backwards, and what… now you’re here? I’m confused.” Corey huffed, his cheeks puffing out as the fur bristled.

“It was a test Father arranged. I’m sorry, luv. I couldn’t tell you I would see you again, you had to fall in love with me to complete the timeloop.” Nyght nuzzled him. “But I must say I have missed this version of you. As wonderful as it was falling in love with you all over again, I am glad to be here now.”

Corey looked skeptical, “No more time shenanigans?”

“No more time shenanigans.” Nyght promised.

“Hmph. Good.”

And the chinchilla pushed himself up onto his toes to reach his demon’s lips for a solid, experienced, kiss.


End file.
